


Årsgång

by Pseudothyrum



Series: The Discoverie of Witchcraft [4]
Category: Constantine (TV), Hellblazer & Related Fandoms, The Question (Comics)
Genre: Case Fic, Child Death, Crossover, Developing Relationship, Gen, Occult horror, Scandinavian Folklore - Freeform, Supernatural Creatures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-29
Updated: 2016-11-29
Packaged: 2018-09-02 23:03:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8686885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pseudothyrum/pseuds/Pseudothyrum
Summary: In New York, Constantine is approached in the middle of the night by a mysterious woman whose baby has gone missing. In Hub City, the Question stumbles upon a bloody murder. Two different cases in two different cities, there's no chance they could be related, and no need for them to work together ever again. Is there?





	

Constantine is sitting in his flat, watching football and halfway to drunk when he hears the noise in his bedroom. He blinks blearily in the direction of the mostly-closed door, thinks through a faint haze of alcohol that it sounds like someone has come in through the shutters. The very squeaky shutters which he knows to be well locked and barred against any intruders who might wish to sneak in, all faceless and self-righteous. Rousing himself he rises and opens the door, to find a young woman standing at the foot of his bed, gazing at the wrinkled, empty sheets in apparent dismay. 

She is young and slim, almost translucently pale, a look heightened by her wild black hair, cascading in knots and tangles to the small of her back. Her eyes, Constantine notices, are gold, and her nails are blackened and long, more like the nails of a wild animal than a woman. She is dressed in a white nightgown, stained and torn in places as though she had run through a forest, which is borne out by the sticks and leaves tangled in her hair, and the dirt on her bare feet. The woman looks up sharply at him as he enters, gold eyes fixing on his face. 

“Hey,” says Constantine.

“You’re John Constantine?” she asks, looking him up and down and seeming thoroughly unimpressed.

“’Fraid so,” he says.

“You aren’t asleep,” she says, sounding faintly scandalized, “It’s three in the morning!” The woman wrinkles her delicate nose, looking about herself with distaste. “And this room is filthy, John Constantine.”

 “Well, I ‘ave better things to do than sleep or clean, don’t I?” he says, nudging an empty bottle under a pile of clothing with his foot as he moves over to flop down on the bed. She clearly notices, arching an eyebrow at him.

 “Right.”

 “I’ve certainly got better things to do than take judgement from a creepy stranger who broke into my house in the middle of the night,” Constantine says, fishing a lighter from his trousers’ pocket, “any particular reason you wanted to catch me all unawares?” The woman shifts uncomfortably. 

“It’s just how I usually... look, don’t worry about it, you have to help me.”

“This is definitely making me want to help you, yeah,” Constantine says, lighting the slightly rumpled cigarette he’d fished from his other pocket. The woman scowls and crosses her arms, her fierce gold eyes flashing as she glares.

“My baby has been stolen, John Constantine. I need you to help me get him back.” Constantine nods seriously.

“Right, I can see why I’d be your first choice, but have you considered maybe trying the cops? They’re dead useful for this sort of thing.” She rolls her eyes.

“I can’t ask the _cops_ ,” she says, as if this should be obvious, “I am nattmara.” She gestures at herself, as though this should be even more obvious. Constantine narrows his eyes.

“A nightmare, eh?” he says, blowing smoke in her direction, “come to give me bad dreams to convince me to help you find your kid?” To her credit, she looks chagrined.

“I was told you might be... difficult to convince,” she says, wrapping her arms around herself again, “It’s the best way I know.” Constantine snorts.

“Your boss is a right miserable sod, but you can say this for him, he never gave me any worse nightmares than I deserved,” The nattmara’s eyes flash in anger 

“The nattmara serve neither man nor god,” she says coldly. Constantine rolls his eyes.

“I’d like to see you tell _him_ that when he’s in one of his pissy moods,” the nattmara’s scowl deepens.

“Will you help me or not? Matias has been gone for two days.” Constantine regards her for a long moment, and she stares back, eyes bright and feral and desperate.

“Kids,” says Constantine, half under his breath, “’course it had to be bloody kids.”

“What does that mean?” the nattmara asks. Constantine snatches his coat off of the lamp and table it had been haphazardly draped over and rises, only a touch unsteadily.

“It means lead the way, love. John Constantine is on the bloody case.” 

***

Vic taps his fingers impatiently on his leg, waiting for his police guard to fall asleep, as he had done every day like clockwork since the Big Ice Cream story broke and Vic had begun receiving death threats in earnest. Enough death threats, eventually, that KBEL had become officially worried and demanded he be given a police escort. While they are distressingly easy to dodge, not least because of their alarming proclivity towards falling asleep when left stationary for more than ten minutes, Vic can’t help but be irritated at their presence. He hates knowing he is being watched, hates even more that he has to be outwardly grateful for their “protection.”

What he wants more than anything is to go out into his city, to investigate what is happening out there. He watches as the cop sitting in his car nods once, twice, then lets his head fall forwards onto his chest. Like a coiled spring finally let loose he leaps into action, practically ricocheting off the walls in his efforts to put his costume on. Within five minutes he is out the window and clambering down the fire escape to meet Hub City’s streets once more.

There aren’t many criminals on the street tonight, which he initially puts down to the threatening thunderstorm, until he catches up to a man whom he saw sprinting away from a woman screaming on the street.

“I didn’t do it, man!” says the man, fingers scrabbling uselessly at Question’s hand holding the front of his shirt, “I didn’t murder them, you can’t put that on me!” Question slackens his grip slightly in confusion.

“Didn’t murder who?” he asks.

“The... the woman and her kid out by Jones Park?” It’s the man’s turn to sound confused, “Isn’t that why you’re out here all... spooky and faceless?”

“You literally just snatched that woman’s purse,” Question says, jerking his thumb back at the woman who is standing and watching them curiously. The man looks down at the purse in his hand, and seems surprised to find it there.

“Oh yeah! I didn’t even mean to, man, habit, you know?” he hands the purse back to the woman, who has ambled over.

“Sorry lady,” he says. She shrugs.

“It’s all right, I have about twenty of them at home, don’t even keep stuff in them anymore,” he nods and they shake hands and Question lets them both leave, shaking his head slightly in confusion. For lack of anything better to do, he heads towards Jones Park.

***

Constantine doesn’t have to take more than a step into the flat to know two important things. One, that whoever snatched the kid didn’t have any inherent magic in them, and two, that Elin could really stand to run a hoover through the place. Though, he supposes, he probably doesn’t have much of a right to judge.

“It’s a lovely place you have here, Elin,” he says, kicking several brightly coloured children’s toys out of his path. 

“If you light that cigarette in my house I’ll tear your eyes out, John,” Elin says sweetly. He hastily pockets it. She gestures towards the door at the end of the hall. “That’s where he was when he... when he was taken,” she wraps her arms around herself, “you can go in and look, if you think it will help.” He does. It looks like he imagines any young child’s room should look, bright and colourful and full of toys. He notes with mild distress that Elin has gone for a superhero theme, leaning heavily towards Blue Beetle.

“Were you home when he was taken?” Constantine asks, poking at the bedding in the crib, as if maybe the kid were just hiding and his mother had missed finding him there for two whole days.

“No,” says Elin, “I was out working, but my husband was here.” She leans out into the hallway, “Kristian! Come here for a minute.” A distressed-looking man with pale blond hair and dark circles under his eyes enters. He is carrying a dark-haired girl on his hip, Constantine estimates she is no more than three. Elin takes the girl and strokes her wild, dark hair sadly, “Embla will grow up to be like me,” she says, “and Matias... he will have magic.” She bites her lip and barely manages to excuse herself before fleeing from the room. Kristian looks as though he has half a mind to follow her, but Constantine stops him with a hand on his arm.

“Before you go, can you tell me about what happened?” For a horrible moment Constantine thinks Kristian is going to cry, but he doesn’t, instead gesturing towards the window over the crib.

“We think he came in through there. I was in the other room with Embla, she was fussing. I came in to check on Matias and the window was open, Matias was gone.” Constantine peers out the window for a moment, taking in the dark woods that the condo complex backs onto.

“You can go sit with Elin and Embla,” he says, “I’ll find him.”

***

It isn’t hard to find the house the purse-snatcher had been talking about, since half a dozen police cars are parked in the street in front of it. A weeping man sits on the steps of the next house along, and is being comforted by a pair of old ladies that Question assumes to be his neighbours. It barely takes any time at all to sidle up to the scene; he imagines the cops are too busy looking busy and important for the cameras to notice people creeping about their crime scene. He takes a long look at the weeping man, and swerves towards a young-looking officer, who is lurking on the edge of the ring of flashing lights.

“What happened here?” he asks, after moving as quickly and silently as possible to stand behind her. She jumps and whirls around to face him. Nailed it.

“M-murder,” she says, one hand over her heart and the other steadying her on the trunk of the car, “a woman and her baby,” her face drains of blood, “it was her first birthday next week.” She barely whispers the last part, and Question reflects that she must be very new to the force indeed.

“How were they killed?” he asks, looking towards the house and wondering if he’ll be able to sneak in. The young officer narrows her eyes at him.

“Should I really be telling you this, _vigilante_?” He does not skip a beat.

“Yes, of course you should,” he says it as though it should be obvious, as though she must have missed a memo. She looks taken aback, but nods. Question is a little surprised it actually works.

“We think it was a robbery gone wrong, the woman clearly came out of her bedroom and saw the perp, he hit her in the hallway, hard enough to leave some blood, she chased him to the kitchen, and he finished her off with a knife there.” She shakes her head, “I can’t understand why she followed him. She could have survived if she’d gone back into her room and hid.”

“He had the baby,” Question says, fists clenching involuntarily. She casts him a strange look.

“That doesn’t make any sense. We found the baby in her crib, she’d been sm-smothered.”

“Did she have her mother’s blood on her?” The cop nods, looking vaguely unwell.

“He had the baby, and he took her back upstairs to kill her so you wouldn’t know why he was really there.” The cop looks stricken, and Question takes a moment to feel pity. “Hub City is a harsh place,” he says, as nicely as he can, “you might want to try transferring to one of the quieter cities. Gotham, maybe.”

***

Constantine stands for a long time, just staring at the poster of Booster Gold on Matias’ wall. If he’s completely honest with himself, an admitted rarity, he has no bloody clue what to do. His fingers twitch towards his packet of fags, but he restrains himself. Elin, he thinks, is not one to bluff, and he’s grown rather fond of his bollocks.

He spins on his heel at the sound of a tapping at the window, and catches a flash of feathers as the bird flies away. He is about to turn back to his useless contemplation of the poster when he catches sight of a slab of rock that has suddenly sprouted out of the ground at the edge of the forest.

“Oi, Elin, Kristian!” he calls towards the door without taking his eyes off the stone, “Has there always been a big bloody runestone in the middle of your yard?”

Elin rushes in, and lets out an audible gasp when she sees it.

“The... the whole forest has changed,” Constantine squints at the trees, but they all look the same to him, “I don’t know what this means.” Constantine shrugs.

“Me neither love, but I know a clue when I see one. Take care of Embla and Kristian, yeah?” With purpose, he leaves Elin’s house, lighting a cigarette the moment his feet are over the threshold. Letting his hand trail briefly over the worn and weathered runestone, too sanded down to be legible even if he could read the language, Constantine walks into the woods.

***

Question walks aimlessly away from the crime scene, heading, he thinks, in the general direction of the park. He is distracted; his mind is still tangled up at that house. His fist clenches involuntarily at the thought of the child’s last, terrified moments. He supposes he never quite got that foundling chip off his shoulder. He is so focused on his thoughts that he doesn’t bother to intervene in the three muggings he passes in the two blocks it takes to reach the park. Increasingly he feels as though he is being drawn somewhere. There is a prickling in his mind, an insistent noise that coalesces, as he steps into the confines of the park, into the sense of someone singing nearby. He finds himself compelled to continue forwards, to seek out the source of the song that resonates not only within his mind but now, he is certain, throughout the park as well.

Approaching the stand of trees that covers half of the park, Question thinks dimly that it seems much darker and deeper than it had been in previous visits to this place. He wonders, fuzzily, if there had always been a large stone here. He lets his hand trail briefly over the surface, noting that it is pitted and scarred as though someone had written on it once, long ago. Question walks into the woods.

***

Question suddenly startles awake, and several things strike him as odd about the situation. Most prominently, he does not remember going to sleep. Only slightly less pressing, he is fully dressed, and on his feet in the middle of a forest, which is an unusual thing to wake up to. He has a vague memory of walking into the forest, but it all feels like a dream, and the forest he is in now is much deeper and darker than the woods in any park in Hub City. He can’t hear singing anymore, if there had ever been any to begin with, though the sense that the sound has just cut off lingers with him. He hears the snapping of branches behind him again, which he registers is the noise that woke him up from... whatever it was. He whips around to see a figure lurching out of the trees towards him. Question readies himself for a fight.

“Bloody fuckin’ trees,” the figure says, mostly to himself, as he tugs his long coat free from where it has tangled.

“Constantine,” Question says, and Constantine looks up, seeming to notice him for the first time.

“Oh. ‘Lo,” he says, straightening from the half-crouch the branches had pulled him into. 

"What are you doing in the woods in the middle of the night?" Question asks, taking in Constantine's almost aggressively unsuitable clothing choices. The man is wearing loafers. In the  _woods_. 

"I could ask you the very same thing, mate," Constantine says, moving to discard his cigarette butt, and then seeming to think better of setting fire to the dry underbrush. Question sighs. 

"I'm... not sure. I think I’m looking for someone. For a case." Constantine's eyes narrow, calculating. 

"That case wouldn’t involve, uh, babies, would it?" It is Question's turn to narrow his eyes. 

"Constantine,” Question says, as calmly as he can, “please tell me you haven’t been kidnapping and sacrificing babies.” Constantine looks affronted, puts a hand to his chest in mock outrage.

“Do you really think so little of me, Question?” Question rolls his eyes, but doesn’t bother to answer. After a moment of searching Question’s blank face Constantine shrugs.

“Nah, someone came to me ‘cause her baby was taken and she wanted me to find him. Then I walked into this bloody forest, and now here I am.”

“Speaking of,” says Question, stomach twisting oddly, “why exactly are you taking jobs in Hub City?” Constantine lights a cigarette.

“I’m not,” he says, “when I walked into this forest it was in New York.”

“That literally makes no sense. I was in Hub City.”

“Magic. A bloody wizard did it, innit.” Question thinks that, were it not for his mask, his eyes would have at some point rolled right out of his head.

“As useful as your magical flippancy is, do you actually have any idea which direction we should be heading? Because I only got this far while mostly unconscious, and--” Constantine cocks his head and holds up a finger.

“Do you hear... singing?” Constantine asks.

“No, but I did earlier before I... fell asleep, or whatever it was that happened,” Constantine nods and sets off purposefully into the woods before Question has even finished speaking, barely tripping over the snarled roots and branches at all. With a heavy sigh, Question follows.

***

Constantine leads the way through the forest, Question hovering silently over his shoulder like the bloody ghost at the feast. Sure, he needs silence so he can follow the thready singing that always seems just on the edge of drifting out of hearing, but still. He is just about to say something himself when they step into a clearing around a small pond, and the singing abruptly cuts off. He looks around and opens his mouth, but doesn’t have a chance to speak.

“Hail and welcome, crown prince of dead friends,” says a seemingly disembodied voice, “hail and welcome, lord of unknowing.” A rotting log that was lying half in the little pool of water suddenly shifts and unfolds itself to reveal a woman, dazzlingly beautiful, with tangled white-blonde hair spilling down well past her waist, covering her seemingly naked torso. Her eyes are an eerily pale blue and, Constantine immediately notices, completely and utterly mad.

“Uh, hi,” says Constantine. She fixes him with an expectant stare, clearly waiting for more. He waves jauntily, then elbows Question, who flinches, then waves awkwardly. “You wouldn’t happen to be a huldra, would you?” asks Constantine. Question looks at him in what he assumes is confusion, and Constantine gestures for him to wait.

“Clever, clever, clever,” the huldra giggles crazily, stirring her finger through the water of the pool, “never met a boy so wise. But who among you two will gladly pay the price?”

“The price?” asks Question.

“Blood,” says Constantine, “I think, unless you have any food or bones tucked away in your coat.”

“Oh, great,” says Question, pulling off his gloves, “why is it every time I’m around you I end up getting hurt?” Constantine reaches out and grabs Question’s hands in his own. The man looks up at him, and seems about to jerk his hands away, but doesn’t.

“I’ll do it,” Constantine says, kneeling down next to the huldra, who is watching him with wide, wild eyes. Taking a breath, he holds his wrist out to her. She snatches his arm without blinking and brings it to her lips. He feels tiny sharp pinpricks as her teeth sink in. It seems only seconds, but almost immediately he feels lightheaded, feels himself begin to pitch sideways. From behind him he hears Question speak sharply, and then his arms are around Constantine’s torso and he’s being dragged backwards, all his weight on Question.

"Jackdaw, jack-fool, such a bloody fief to rule," the huldra says, wiping blood off her chin, “A chambered house you’ve carved and own, but no one sees what they’ve been shown.”

"I'm not sure she's all there, love," Constantine whispers to Question, who drags Constantine a little further away across the leaves, never breaking eye contact with the twisted woman. Constantine finds himself half-lying in Question’s lap, Question’s arms still wrapped tightly around him as though afraid to let him go. Constantine, dizzy and weak, just lies there.

“He gave you what you wanted,” Question says angrily, “now you have to help us. What can you tell us about the children?”

"Charlie boy, the child king, in what dark place could you not sing? Sage of name, not yet of mind, you seek what you don't need to find. A seize, assize, a Szasz, a sigh, an answer sought will soon come by." Constantine feels Question stiffen behind him, his arms growing tighter around Constantine’s chest, one hand fisted in Constantine’s jacket

"Did she say Zsasz? Constantine asks, "like the serial killer? Isn't he usually in Gotham?" Question doesn't answer him. 

"Who took them?" Question asks, still angry for reasons Constantine doesn’t quite understand. The huldra looks between them for a long moment, then smacks her hand on the surface of the water, and Constantine jerks back to avoid getting splashed.

"What the bloody-" he is silenced by Question's hand on his arm, pointing at a soft glow in the pool that seems to be rising towards them. It takes less than a minute for the orb of light to break the surface. It twinkles for a moment, then begins to drift unsteadily through the woods. Constantine and Question stare at each other for a moment, then scramble up, Constantine leaning heavily on Question, and chase the shimmering light into the trees. 

***

Question supports Constantine as they hobble through the woods. The man is still pale, his eyes a touch glazed, but he’s been looking increasingly better since they left the clearing with the creepy woman in it. The creepy woman who had almost bled Constantine to death. Question realizes that his arm has grown tight around Constantine’s middle, and he forces himself to relax his grip. Constantine glances at him sideways, but says nothing. Ahead of them, the ball of light twinkles between the trees, leading them ever deeper. Despite the path seeming tangled and overgrown beyond repair, they never seem to trip over any exposed roots or branches, their only struggle brought about by Constantine’s occasionally faltering steps.

Suddenly, with no warning or even a glimpse of it through the trees, they are standing in front of a wooden house, the ball of light bobbing almost apprehensively just on the edge of the trees. The house looks, for lack of a better word, unhealthy. Rotting in places, in utter disrepair, with Spanish moss and long, drooping columns of pink-red flowers hanging off it, the house looks as though it has been abandoned and dying for years. A tree seems to have sprouted up through the floors and emerged through one of the upper windows, but has since withered and died, leaving dry fingers of branches clawing at the roof and crumbling sideboards as if desperate to escape. The ball of light drifts forward, then immediately drifts back, as though trying to urge them into the house without approaching it itself.

“Uh, thanks,” Question says to the light as he pulls Constantine up to the steps. They walk up gingerly, Question nearly breaking an ankle when one of the crumbling steps gives way beneath his feet. The door, Question finds when he tries it, is unlocked, and opens inwards into a fetid hallway, dark and cold and dripping. From somewhere deep inside comes the sound of scratching and scrabbling, like a wild animal is trapped in the bowels of the house.

“Well,” says Question, “I bet this is going to go great.” Constantine snorts, taking his arm from around Question’s neck and hobbling a few steps into the foyer.

“Nothing for it but to have a butcher’s,” he says impenetrably, takes one more step, and pitches forward. Question dives for him, and manages to get under him before he hits the floor.

“Ta,” says Constantine, utterly nonchalant even as Question tries to juggle his dead weight to allow them both to stand up. “Where do you reckon we need to go?” Constantine asks as Question finally gets him propped up in a generally standing posture. “Upstairs or down?” From above them comes a loud crashing sound, followed by a deluge of rust-red water pouring through the ceiling several feet ahead of them. Question looks at Constantine.

“If you think I’m carrying you up those stairs you’re dreaming.”

***

That they make it up the stairs is nothing short of a miracle, though Question does not make good on his threat to abandon Constantine to his own devices and explore the house for himself. Constantine is both grateful and unsurprised by this, considering that the air of the place reeks of despair, so utterly laden with wrongness that it is almost tangible. Constantine can feel the cloying, claustrophobic closeness of the atmosphere on his skin, takes it in with every breath, that sweetish, oily scent of death and hate and fear that coats your throat and lingers in your lungs. He wonders absently if Question feels it as sharply as he does, or if he only feels uneasy.

From the end of the hallway comes scraping, as of something heavy being dragged across wood. A voice, low and urgent, can be heard muttering every time the scraping ceases. Constantine slides his arm from around Question again and walks towards the door, believing himself, with the confidence of a drunkard, to be quite steady. He is about to place his hand on the handle when Question stops him.

“Don’t be stupid,” Question hisses, taking hold of the handle himself, “what are you going to do, fall on the guy?” Moving so his whole body is between Constantine and the door, Question pushes it open. Getting a glimpse inside, Constantine lets out a low whistle.

“Well me old son,” he says to the crouched man in the middle of the room, tamping down the revulsion that threatens to rise up and overwhelm him, “looks like you’ve been a right busy bee.” Question, for his part, has gone still. Dangerously still, the kind of still that is often poetically associated with an incoming storm. Constantine grabs Question’s elbow, as if he would be able to restrain him. Question does not react, does not turn his head from where his gaze seems to be fixed on the man or, more likely, on the small, dripping, lifeless body clutched in the man’s hands.

It is not, of course, the only small body in the room. Of course it isn’t. That would be too easy. But it is the only one with wild dark hair and wide, staring, golden eyes. His grip on Question’s elbow tightens so much that his knuckles turn white. Question doesn’t even flinch, doesn’t turn his head to look at the bodies in various states of decay, some mummified, some almost fresh. Constantine estimates maybe a dozen of them are lying around the room, neatly laid out in little boxes packed with salt. In the box nearest to them is a little girl, perhaps two years old, with long, curly blonde hair. Constantine’s grip on Question’s arm tightens even further, finally drawing Question’s attention. He looks down at Constantine’s hand on his arm, then looks up at Constantine.

“Oh,” says the man on the floor, casually letting Matias’ body fall into the pool of water still draining from the large, overturned bathtub, “hello. How nice to have visitors. I’m Thomas,” he holds out his hand to shake, but neither Constantine nor Question make a move towards it. Several desultory beads of rust-red water drip off his fingers before he lowers his hand. Thomas’ smile wavers slightly. “Well,” he says, wiping his hands on the front of his sweater vest, leaving streaks of red, “what can I do for you gentlemen?” 

“You can start,” Constantine says angrily, stepping away from Question and raising a finger to point menacingly at Thomas, “by explaining just what the bloody hell--” his steps falter and he pitches backwards, his body suddenly remembering how much blood he’d lost.

“For god’s sake,” Question mutters, catching him again, “can you maybe not for five minutes?” Through it all Thomas watches them with concern, dry-washing his hands and looking between them.

“Oh dear, is he all right?” he asks as Question drags Constantine back towards the door and props him up against the wall.

“He’s much better off than you will be,” Question says darkly.

“You want I should send him to Hell, love?” Constantine asks from the floor. Question doesn’t deign to look back at him. Thomas, for his part, looks wounded.

“To Hell?” he asks, “Why?”

“Oh, I dunno, squire,” Constantine says, “why d’you think? I’m wagering on your frankly appalling sweater vest, meself.” Thomas looks down at his own torso, then shakes his head as if completely certain that that can’t possibly be it, then looks around the room. His eyes light up with sudden understanding.

“The babies!” he says, “You’re here about the babies!”

“Got it in one,” Constantine says, “Give the man his prize, Question.” Question takes a step towards Thomas, and he backs up by several steps, hands held out placatingly.

“You don’t understand,” he whines, “I _had_ to do it.”

“You’d be amazed how many people say that to me,” Contantine says, “and by how many of those people are dead now.” At this Question turns back to face him, and Thomas scurries to a corner of the room and uncovers a large chest.

“We can’t kill him, John.”

“I think you’ll find that we can. I’ll do it if you want to step out of the room. A few simple words, he won’t feel a thing.” Constantine grins wickedly. Thomas finishes dragging the chest towards them, and begins fiddling with the lock.

“You can barely stand up!” Question protests. Thomas finally opens the chest, and in one violent motion heaves it over onto its side, cutting short their bickering. The living thing that was within it spills out, writhing and kicking against its bonds.

It looks like an unnaturally large lamb, its snow-white wool matted with dirt and blood. Its spindly, too-long legs are twisted up and bound together. Most notably of all, its heart is on the outside of its body, pulsing furiously as the creature tries to force its way free.

“I touched its heart” Thomas says reverently, falling to his knees and trying to gather the lamb’s head into his lap. The thing shies away from him, frightened bleating sounds escaping despite the dirty bit of fabric wound around its muzzle. “I touched the heart of the kyrkogrim, and it showed me the truths of the universe. Don’t you see? There is nothing. There is no meaning to life. We are born to die.” He seizes the kyrkogrim’s head and pulls it towards himself, stroking it gently despite its renewed struggles. “I saw the truth, and now I am helping to hasten the children along their way.” He grins up at Question.

“Okay, wow,” says Question, “that is literally insane.” Thomas’ grin goes out like a light and he drops the kyrkogrim, which begins to wiggle its body in order to move across the floor away from the two men. Constantine silently roots for it.

“That’s all right,” Thomas mutters, “that’s okay. You just don’t understand. I’ll show you.”

With a surprisingly swift flurry of blows he knees Question in the stomach, sweeps his feet out from under him, punches him twice in the head, and, grabbing his hair, drags him towards the twitching kyrkogrim, which redoubles its efforts to wiggle out the door. He seizes Question’s hand and pulls it towards the kyrkogrim’s heart. Constantine struggles to move, but his body refuses to obey, and he can only watch.

“Don’t worry,” Thomas grins over at him when he notices Constantine’s abortive movements, “You’ll be next.”

Suddenly Question comes to life, executing a series of impressively athletic movements that end with Thomas groaning on the floor and Question holding one of his arms wrenched up into the air, his foot planted firmly on Thomas’ back.

“Okay,” says Question, using his free hand to smooth his hair back into place, “okay, none of this makes any sense to me, so here is what we’re going to do. We are going to find some way to contact the authorities, we’re going to hand this man over to them, and then there is going to be a lot of explaining going on.”

From around the room comes a susurrus of movement, a sound like gravel pouring onto wood. A lone baby’s solemn, plaintive wail breaks the strange stillness of the air. Constantine glances towards the small coffins, where tiny mummified hands are being thrust into the air, fingers stretching and clenching at the walls of their coffins, dragging their owners upwards. As they move they seem to fill out, returning to how they must have appeared before they died, each one softly glowing and vaguely translucent. All of the children have begun wailing now, crawling or toddling from their makeshift place of rest towards Thomas and Question, who drops the other man’s hand and stumbles backwards. Before Thomas can more than roll over onto his back the first child reaches him, and crawls up to cling to his leg.

“No,” Thomas whimpers, trying to kick the child off, “no, no.” The other children reach him, each one clinging to him, holding despite his increasingly frantic efforts to shake them off. Matias is the last, and he climbs up to sit on Thomas’ chest, taking Thomas’ face between his small hands.

“You are guilty,” Matias says haltingly, and the wails of the other babies reach a crescendo, joined by Thomas’ horrified shrieking. Constantine cannot tear his eyes away, doesn’t even notice that Question has moved until the man is beside him, gathering him up and dragging him out of the room and down the stairs. They do not stop moving until they are standing in the yard before the house. The sounds suddenly cut off, but Constantine has no desire to go back into the house, to see what the result of a myling’s revenge might be. Question, for his part, is breathing raggedly, holding tightly to Constantine as though afraid that Constantine might be snatched away next. Constantine turns to look away from the house, out towards what appears to be a city. The forest has retreated, sits only behind the house now. He fishes out his phone with the arm not around Question’s neck.

“Phone’s working,” he says, “I think we ought to call the police and have them come up here. Make sure those kids get a proper burial.” Question nods and takes the phone.

“What will we do? After, I mean.” Constantine shrugs.

“We have to go into the woods and hope it takes us back to where I entered. I... I have some people I need to talk to.”

***

The woods do take them back to where Constantine says he came from, and via a seemingly much shorter route, according to Constantine. He insists on going into the house on his own, leaving Question to sit by the runestone. He tries to seek his centre, but fails repeatedly. Try as he might, he can’t get the wailing of the phantom children- mylings, Constantine had called them- out of his mind. When he closes his eyes he can see their tiny bodies, the jerky first movements when they had emerged from their coffins. He shudders and opens his eyes wide, staring in the direction of the house Constantine had entered, urging him to hurry. 

When he does emerge finally, he is smoking a cigarette and swaggering in his inimitable way. Question wonders how it is possible to have seen so many things that a scene like what they had left behind in that house had no effect on you whatsoever. He stands to greet Constantine, who grins at him.

“All right, Question?” he asks. Question shrugs, and Constantine nods, like that is the response he was expecting. “I’ll walk you back home.” Constantine says, looking into the forest and taking a long drag on his cigarette. “All kinds of nasties in the woods these days.” He seems to have greatly recovered the strength he lost, or at least makes a good show of having done so, so Question just nods and falls into step beside him as they head into the forest.

“One thing I don’t understand,” Constantine says after several long minutes of silent walking, “is why the huldra mentioned Victor Zsasz. He didn’t bleeding show up at all. Unless... do you think he’s in here too? Bloody hell, as if this day weren’t long enough.”

“No,” says Question, “She said Szasz, not Zsasz.” Constantine looks at him blankly.

“You just said the same thing twice, love,” he says after a long moment. Question shrugs uncomfortably.

“Szasz is my real last name. I changed it when I got into journalism. Easier to spell.”

“Your... wait. Are you telling me your real name is bloody Victor Szasz?” Constantine sounds like he’s on the verge of laughing, and Question scowls behind his mask.  

“No. I changed my first name too. It’s Charles. Charlie,” he amends, unsure of why he’s telling Constantine this; it’s something he rarely tells anyone anymore.

“Charlie Szasz,” Constantine says contemplatively, as though testing out the name, “I like it. You look like a Charlie. You know, when you have a face.” Question snorts, but doesn’t respond. It takes a few more minutes to reach the edge of the woods, the lights and sundry fires of Hub City sparkling at them, bringing sudden light to the gloom of the forest. They linger for a moment on the edge of the trees.

“Will you come with me?” Question asks suddenly, startling even himself, “I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep tonight.” Constantine regards him for a long moment.

“Yeah,” he says finally, “all right.”

***

It doesn’t take long to reach Question’s place, Constantine obligingly leaning against nearby walls and smoking as Question takes out his nervous energy on a series of muggers. Constantine even at one point takes a moment to talk to a man who had tried to stab Question in the back, leaving the man a shivering, weeping wreck.

“What did you say to him?” Question asks as they walk away, glancing over his shoulder at the man, who is clawing at his own face and sobbing.

“Trust me, love,” Constantine grins, “You don’t want to know.”

His house, Question finds, is almost distressingly normal and familiar. After everything that has happened over the past few hours, he feels like it should have changed, like the world should have changed, not just himself. He gestures towards his couch.

“You can make yourself comfortable, help yourself to whatever’s in the fridge, I’ll be right back.” He goes to his bedroom and shucks off his suit, taking off his mask and sighing, breathing deeply for what feels like the first time all night. Redressed in jeans and a t-shirt, he returns to his kitchen where Constantine, who has draped his coat over the island, is standing in front of the open fridge, staring into it without appearing to actually see what’s inside.

“Are you oka--” he starts to ask, but is cut off by Constantine suddenly collapsing onto him, holding the front of his shirt and weeping. “Oh,” he says, uncertain of what to do. He kicks the fridge closed and brings his arms up around Constantine’s shaking shoulders. “It’s okay,” he says softly, gently urging Constantine, who is still clinging to him, towards the couch, “you’re okay. I’m here.” He isn’t really sure what he’s saying, and Constantine doesn’t seem to be listening anyways. He maneuvers them onto the couch and sits, with Constantine half on top of him, still crying.

“I had to tell her,” Constantine says between sobs, “I had to tell her that her only son was dead. And it was all my fault.”

“No, it wasn’t,” Charlie says, running his hand through Constantine’s hair, “you didn’t do this. It was Thomas. There was nothing either of us could do. He was dead when we got there.”

“All those kids,” Constantine whispers, his sobbing having quieted but the tears still streaming down his face, “why is it always kids. Why can’t I ever save them?” Charlie doesn’t answer, doesn’t think that there is any answer that he can give to that. He just sits and strokes Constantine’s hair, making occasional soothing noises. Finally Constantine stills, seeming to have exhausted himself. Charlie wonders if maybe he has fallen asleep.

“Hey,” he says softly, nudging Constantine and putting his hand over the hand that is clenched in his shirt, “hey, are you feeling better? Do you want to sleep in my bed, because I can sleep out here tonight.” Constantine slowly raises his head from Charlie’s chest, and though his eyes are red-rimmed you almost wouldn’t know he had been crying. “Are you--” he starts again, but is cut off by Constantine leaning in and kissing him. His mind goes blank for a long moment, and he lets himself sink into the feeling, but then his brain snaps back on and Charlie jerks his head away. 

“Oh,” he says, shocked. Constantine’s face crumples, but almost immediately he is back to his normal, unruffled expression. He pulls back, feigning confidence, though the set of his shoulders is all wrong.

“Sorry,” he says, beginning to rise, “I’ll just--" 

“No!” Charlie reaches out and grabs his hand, pulling him back down, grabbing hold of his shoulders to keep him in place when he’s seated. “No, I just thought-- you were so upset, I thought maybe you didn’t... mean it.” His words sound pathetic to his own ears, like he’s a preteen asking if his crush likes him back, and he feels himself flush as Constantine searches his face.

“I did,” Constantine says, nothing mocking in his voice, “did you?” Charlie looks up, meets Constantine’s eyes, and nods. Constantine grins. “Good,” he says, and leans in again.


End file.
